


rejoice, rejoice

by ghost_gang



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Love Confessions, M/M, Magic Mirrors, Period-Typical Homophobia, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Sorry Not Sorry, Stucky Secret Santa 2017
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-14 01:45:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12997140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghost_gang/pseuds/ghost_gang
Summary: At age 18, everyone receives an enchanted mirror that will show them the image of their soulmate.The only problem being that Bucky is in love with his best friend, Steve, and is sure that they would be the perfect match—but it’s 1935, and the world isn't so kind.





	rejoice, rejoice

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Spacedog](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spacedog/gifts).



> This was written as a gift for the 2017 Stucky Secret Santa Exchange for the wonderful [softpunkbucky](http://softpunkbucky.tumblr.com/) / spacedog. 
> 
> I'm sorry, I did not have a lot of time to edit this! I may change a few things around. Things have been hectic, and I thought I would have enough time to write this and get another chapter of Water up, but there are simply not enough hours in the day. Thank you for being patient with me! I hope you like this story. I've been wanting to do an AU like this for a long time, and I finally did it. Yay!

Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, and always perseveres. 

-CORINTHIANS 13:6-7

* * *

**MARCH 7, 1935**

Bucky figures out he’s in love with Steve Rogers just days before he gets his mirror.

He really should have seen it coming, honestly — Bucky has known Steve his whole life, since the day Bucky found him walking home after school and some jerks were trying to steal his money. Steve had nearly torn Bucky a new one, even though he had helped him, even while there was blood spilling from Steve’s nose and dripping onto his white shirt.

And God, he’s never seen a more lovely sight than Steve when he gets passionate about something: fire in his eyes, and—more often than not with these kind of things—blood on his mouth, scrapes on his knuckles.

Steve is a different picture right now, but still just as lovely.

Bucky glances away from the book he’s reading to look around the room. The curtains are open, bathing the room in golden, natural light. Bucky is lying on his bed while Steve draws in his sketchbook on the window seat.

He sits up, setting his book aside for a moment, and looks at Steve. He’s still wearing his school uniform and his hair is falling into his eyes — he really ought to get a haircut, but trying times has Steve out of money. He has a job, yes, but he tries to save every penny he possibly can.

He paints signs for the grocery store on his block. He’s quite good at it, and the manager of the store is always pleased with his work, but Steve is fantastic at not accepting or even _believing_ compliments thrown his way. Bucky really thinks that Steve ought to go to art school, but Steve has told him over and over again that he either wouldn’t be good enough to get in or doesn’t have the money to get in, and _no, I will not accept your money, Buck, give it a rest already, would you?_

 _Alright, alright, jeez_ , Bucky had said, rolling his eyes. _You’d think I’d asked you to jump off a bridge or something._

Bucky realizes that he’s been staring when Steve looks up from his sketchpad and smiles at him. He looks away quickly, and Steve chuckles at him.

“You need something, Buck?” he asks.

“Just can’t believe how ugly you are,” Bucky shoots back, pretending to flip a page in his book.

“You wound me,” Steve deadpans. Then he laughs and says, “You’re just jealous of my beautiful eyes.”

“You caught me,” Buck says, sitting up just so Steve can see his sarcastic grin. With a wink, he adds, “You know how I feel about your eyes, sweetheart.”

Steve scoffs and rolls his eyes, saying, “You’re full of shit, Barnes.”

And when Steve turns back to his drawing, his eyes twinkling, Bucky realizes something. There’s a feeling stirring within his chest when Steve his eyes and smiles like that, like someone has a vice grip on his heart and is squeezing it just right.

Fuck.

 

It’s not like Bucky doesn’t like girls. In fact, he’s quite enamored by them—their long hair, their soft skin, their lilting tones. It’s just that they’re not Steve—Bucky can appreciate them, Bucky can even date them and be attracted to them, but no girl he’s met can match Steve’s floppy bangs, his scabbed knuckles, his deep voice. No person has ever fit Bucky so perfectly, and Bucky can feel that down in his soul—Steve is rough were Bucky is smooth, Steve is cold where Bucky runs hot, give and take, push and pull, till death do we part, amen.

In the end, Bucky chalks it up to nervousness. He’s getting his mirror in three days, and he knows that everything will change. Steve—Steve is just a lifeline to hold onto in the face of the turning tides. Everything is about to be so different.

 

**MARCH 10th, 1935**

His parents invite Steve to stay for dinner. Well, more like Bucky’s mother tries to barrage Steve into staying for dinner, because she thinks that a good meal will somehow make Steve gain twenty more pounds and grow six inches taller. But Steve manages to escape, even at the threat of mashed potatoes and roast beef. Bucky can see how much Steve wants to stay, but he tells Winifred that his mother really needs him at home and that he can’t stay a second longer, even though he would really rather not go.

Winifred begrudgingly allows Steve to go, but makes him promise that he will spend a night here during the coming week. This, Steve allows.

Bucky is relieved that Steve decides to go, and then feels guilty for wanting his best friend gone. Bucky is having trouble picking apart his feelings, and Steve being right there in front of him makes it even more difficult. Either way, Bucky walks him to the front door.

Before Steve steps outside, he gives Bucky a hug, his scrawny arms wrapping around Bucky’s neck. He’s still wearing his church clothes, for crying out loud. Bucky’s heart thumps, his throat dry.

“Happy birthday,” he says into Bucky’s ear, giving him a clap on the shoulder as he pulls away.

Bucky pulls back and laughs nervously, saying, “I almost thought you’d forgotten.”

“Of course not,” Steve says, grinning. Steve glances down shyly before reaching into the pocket of his dress pants and handing Bucky a piece of paper. “This is all I could afford, Buck. I’m sorry we didn’t get to go this last year.”

Confused, Bucky takes the paper offered to him—from the thickness, Bucky recognizes it as sketchbook parchment, and he gingerly turns over the page and looks at it with an appraising eye: it’s a picture of Coney Island, with its Ferris wheel and rollercoaster in a clear, realistic rendering.

It terrifies him how Steve seems to know him as well, if not better, than he knows himself.

“Thank you,” he says. The words can’t do justice to how grateful he feels, but his tone betrays his emotion. But Steve doesn’t make fun of him, just waves goodbye as Bucky shuts the front door.

+++

When dinner is over, the family gathers in the living room so Bucky can open his gifts. He knows already what one will be—it’s a rite of passage for young adults, and Bucky has finally come of age.

There are smaller gifts stacked on top of a larger, flat box. Bucky’s mother hands him the stack, which he takes gratefully.

His four younger siblings all watch, enrapt, as Bucky takes the wrapping paper off of the largest box.

Bucky takes the string off the box, putting it to the side. He takes the wrapping paper off the box and takes off the lid.

“Whoa,” Bucky says. He smiles at his parents and says, “You shouldn’t have.”

His mother rolls her eyes.

The mirror inside is not a surprise—everyone gets one, and Bucky is hardly the first of his classmates to receive one. And it truly is beautiful—it has an ornate silver handle and frame, and the glass itself is shiny and new. Bucky loves the look of it.

“This mirror,” his mother says, “is a window into the life of your soulmate. When you both look into it at the same time, you’ll be able to see each other’s face.”

Bucky nods, being careful as to how he holds the mirror. He doesn’t want to scratch it or smudge it with his hands. At school, Bucky will say that he doesn’t really care. But in the privacy of his home, he’ll admit it to himself: he wants a soulmate. This is important to him, and he’s been waiting for this for a while now.

“You’ll always be connected,” she says. “Even if you don’t meet her.”

Bucky frowns. He isn’t naive—he knows that soulmates can go their entire lives without meeting, but that’s not what he’s focused on. It’s that one word— _her._

His hands go slack for just a second before he tightens his grip again. His stomach turns, but he pushes down that feeling for now.

As of now, the mirror is empty. It doesn’t reflect his face, but it seems to be peering into a world where he can’t make out any definite shapes, as if there’s a sheet pulled over the glass. It isn’t pitch black, which is a good sign—his mother tells him that means that his soulmate is younger than him and the mirror made for her has yet to be created. If it was pitch black, that only means one thing—his soulmate is either dead, or never existed to begin with.

“Your mirror will glow when hers is created,” she says. “Or, that’s what I’ve heard, at least.”

Bucky nods again. He wonders for a moment whether or not his father and his mother are soulmates, but he knows better than to ask. If the answer is no, then he’ll live with the uncomfortable knowledge that his parents aren’t as well-suited for each other as someone else, out there.

If they are, then good for them. Bucky opens the rest of the gifts with robotic movements, thanks his family for the presents, and excuses himself to bed, claiming that he is tired.

As he makes his way up the stairs, he holds his mirror with an iron grip—he doesn’t want to drop it, because what kind of person would he be, to treat the frame of his soulmate with such carelessness?

When he gets back to his room, he flicks on the lights and stares at the walls, not really knowing what to do with himself. He’s not entirely sure how he feels about the soulmate thing, and is a little afraid to be in possession of his mirror now — there are a million thoughts churning around his head. Before, turning eighteen and finding his soulmate had been so far away, like distant, wishful thoughts. But now it’s here, and it’s happening, and there’s a little more time for him to come to terms with this but who knows when his soulmate will get her mirror? And then he’ll see her and he’ll know and his life will be changed forever, and he may not get to meet her and how will he be able to get on with his life after that?

But does he really want to spend his life not knowing?

He wants to tell Steve — his best friend will be turning eighteen next year, and the kid is ecstatic about learning about his soulmate. But Bucky isn’t sure for some reason; he doesn’t want to tell Steve about his soulmate. Not for the desire of keeping her to himself, just… because.

Shaking his head, he sets the mirror on his dresser, peering at the glass one more time before he turns off the lights and climbs under the covers.

He falls asleep watching the mirror from his bed, and dreams about it glowing in the darkness of his room, of peering into it and seeing Steve’s floppy blond hair and bright blue eyes.

 

**JUNE 14, 1936**

“My ma isn’t doing so good,” Steve tells him.

It’s summer—Steve graduated high school and immediately dove into the workforce, painting signs, doing grunt work.

The medical bills are piling up and Steve is trying to find work fast enough to pay for them, but frequently he has to cut corners for himself when there wasn’t much wiggle room to begin with.

“She’s been out sick for nearly a week and a half,” Steve says. He shakes his head. “Won’t admit she’s sick, though. Says it’s just a cold.”

“Wow, sounds like somebody I know,” Bucky drawls.

Steve gives him a Look, and Bucky promptly shuts his mouth.

They make their way from the bus stop to Bucky’s house. He is trying to save up—he’s going to buy a house, get a loan from the bank, maybe. He’s doing well at work, he might even get promoted soon.

When they get inside, Bucky offers Steve a sandwich, which he promptly declines.

Bucky gives Steve a long, withering look. “Steve, take it,” he requests. “How long has it been since you ate three meals a day?”

Steve eyes the bread like a wolf eyes a deer. God, the kid must be starving—Bucky knows that he’s mostly been surviving off of boiled potatoes and wilted, canned spinach.

“You think I don’t know you by now?” Bucky says. “Buddy, I know you’ve been cutting down on your meals. C’mon.”

Steve reluctantly agrees.

+++

“Is this your mirror?” Steve asks.

Bucky looks over to where Steve is standing, peering into the mirror that his mother gave him. Over a year ago, now. Bucky still hasn’t seen the mirror glow, he hasn’t seen any sign of who is supposed to be on the other side.

Bucky’s mother asks him frequently— _have you seen her yet?_ Bucky always tells her, no, he hasn’t. He doesn’t tell her he doesn’t want to.

“Yeah,” Bucky says, feeling wary for some reason. “You can touch it if you want.”

Steve carefully reaches out and lifts it from its place on the dresser, holding it with two firm yet gentle hands, the way Steve held most important things.

“Have you seen your soulmate yet?” Steve asks.

“No,” Bucky says. “I haven’t really looked into it. My ma said that my soulmate is probably younger than I am, and that’s why it’s dark. The mirror for her hasn’t even been made yet.”

“Wow,” Steve marvels. “I wonder who it could be.”

 _You_ , Bucky thinks, desperately, hopefully. _I want it to be you._

But he knows how things are.

Steve is getting his mirror in a month.

+++

When Steve leaves for the night, Bucky wraps the mirror in a loose sheet, taking care not to smudge the edges or the glass. It still stares blankly at him, not reflecting anything, like a window looking out into the night. He covered the glass securely, tucking the edge of the fabric in, and put the mirror into his drawer. He doesn't want to look at it again.

 

**JULY 4, 1936**

When Steve gets his mirror, he can barely hold himself together. Steve has always wanted to get his mirror, excited at the possibility of falling in love, of being perfectly together with someone. But as his birthday inched closer, Bucky could see that he was getting more and more nervous.

Steve’s nervousness always unsettled Bucky. The guy was like a rock—nothing could shake him, nothing could make him panic. He was steady, calm. But this was different.

On some level, Bucky knows what Steve thinks of himself: he knows he’s good enough, he knows he’s capable of many things. Sometimes he overreaches, yeah, but that’s better than never trying, right? But not everyone sees Steve like that. They treat him like a kid, they baby him or push him around.

Bucky can basically _see_ these thoughts turning over in Steve’s mind as he tears off the thin, brown wrapping paper of his mirror. Steve’s ma sits close by, her shoulders wrapped up in a blanket, her face wan.

“I’m sorry it’s not so big, sweetheart,” she tells Steve. “It was all I could afford.”

Steve takes the cover off the box and looks at it, the simple wooden handle and plain finish.

Steve beams at his mom. “It’s perfect,” he tells her. “Thank you.”

He gets up and drops a kiss on top of her head.

“Oh, stop,” she says, but she’s smiling.

Finally, Steve goes back to sit next to Bucky and gets a proper look inside it for the first time: Steve’s mirror is dark. Not dark like Bucky’s mirror, like it had a gray sheet over the top of it. It was dark like it’s showing the inside of a room with the lights off.

“Huh,” Steve says. He pulls his eyebrows together, moves one hand to cradle the back of the mirror.  Bucky doesn’t like the look of distress on his face, and moves a hand over to pat his knee in a friendly way.

“Maybe she lives on the other side of the world,” Bucky says. “Where it’s nighttime.”

“That makes sense,” Steve says. He looks a little troubled, though. Finally, he says, “She exists, right? She’s around.”

Bucky wants to laugh, because he seems so bent out of shape. But he knows that Steve is serious, and that this is obviously something that is bothering him, so he doesn’t tease him. “Of course, bud,” he assures Steve. “It would just reflect your own face if she wasn’t around,” he adds. He swallows with a click. “Maybe she’s younger than you.”

“Okay,” Steve says, nodding. “Okay.”

He looks at the mirror for a long second, and Bucky can see that he’s debating with himself. After a moment, so soft that he almost doesn’t hear him, Steve says, “I always worried I wouldn’t have one. A soulmate, that is. That there was no one in the world that could possibly want me.”

“Don’t you dare speak like that, Steven,” his mother says, sharply, the same time Bucky says, “There’s no way that that could ever be true, pal.”

Steve nods, looking slightly unconvinced, but smiling all the same at Bucky’s and Sarah’s quick answers.

Bucky aches and aches to tell Steve, but holds his tongue. Would Steve even believe him if he told him how gone he was on him? Would Steve even accept Bucky’s love, even if he doesn’t return it? He wants Steve to see himself, to appreciate himself the way Bucky appreciates him. But he couldn’t do it, not now — not when Steve finally has his mirror, a shot at true happiness. It’s too late, now.

 

**APRIL 27, 1943**

Bucky must be dead, and that’s okay.

If Bucky’s mirror is empty, then he wouldn’t know. If the mirror has someone inside, then he wouldn’t know. And that is fine.

But he must be dead, because there’s no other way that he would be staring up at Steve now, looking like an angel. Steve, towering over him, calling his name, smiling at him when Bucky says, “Is that…?”

“It’s me,” he says. “It’s Steve.”

And fuck if that doesn’t just make his goddamn day, his goddamn _life._

“Steve,” he says, smiling. “ _Steve._ ”

If he’s going to die here, he would rather die not knowing who his soulmate could have been. If he’s going to die here, it’s only his wish that Steve keeps looking at him like that. Looking at him like he’s worth something, like he’s worthy of having Steve with him in the afterlife, in his final moments.

Maybe God doesn’t mind that Bucky is queer. Maybe he’s okay with that.

Bucky would snort at the thought, but he’s pulled back to the present when Steve pulls him to his feet, feeling surprisingly solid and not like a hallucination or like ghostly wishful-thinking.

“Come on,” Steve says, as Bucky stumbles to his feet. And holy fuck, maybe Bucky isn’t dead, because there’s no way he could dream up _this—_ Steve, bigger, taller, stronger than he was. Stronger than _Bucky_.

“Whoa,” Bucky says.

“I thought you were dead,” Steve says.

 _Me, too_ , he doesn’t say. “I thought you were smaller,” Bucky does say.

 

**MAY 5, 1943**

The walk back to base is tense, to say the least. Steve never knew when to stop pressing, and he’s trying to get Bucky to open up about his time on the table.

The truth is, Bucky would rather eat his own gun than relive that time — he’s not going to utter a fucking word to anyone, no matter how much Steve presses. _Get fucking used to it_ , he wants to say.

It’s not made any better when Bucky walks up to the fire one night to sit with the guys he got to know so well in confinement—Dugan, Morita, Gabe Jones, Falsworth, Dernier. Steve has made fast friends with the lot of them, and Bucky doesn’t really know how he feels about that, how Steve easily makes friends now where he struggled to be accepted before. He figures it can’t hurt, but he still feels wary, for whatever reason.

As Bucky approaches, listening in on the conversation, he realizes that the guys are all talking about their soulmates. Out of all of them, Jim is the only one to have actually met his, smiling as he describes her in great detail. Bucky turns to go, not wanting to really be a part of his conversation, when Dum Dum calls after him: “Hey, Barnes, what about you?”

Internally, Bucky is damning everything to hell and back. Externally, Bucky turns around, plastering a smile on his face. He laughs nervously and says, “What?”

“What about _your_ soulmate?” Steve asks on behalf of Dugan. He inclines his head as he continues, “What’s she like? You’ve never told me.”

Bucky shrugs, deciding to get out with it. “I don’t know,” he admits. “I haven’t touched my mirror since I got it.”

Surprised, Dugan says, “Really?”

“Yeah,” Bucky replies, picking at a loose thread on the cuff of his uniform. Bucky chances a look up, watching the faces of his teammates.

“Don’t you want to know who she is?” Gabe asks, eyebrows pulled together.

“Not really,” Bucky replies. “I put the mirror in my drawer at home and left it after that.”

Steve narrows his eyes at him, and that is the moment that Bucky realizes he’s in serious trouble.

“ _What_ ,” Bucky snaps, doing nothing to help Steve’s righteous fury.

“What if she wants to find you?” Steve says sharply. “What if this whole time she’s been trying to reach you and all they can get a glimpse of is your fucking sock drawer?”

Bucky’s tone hardens as he says, “And who gave you the right to boss me around, tough guy? It’s none of your business what I do with my soulmate or how. What’s it matter to you, anyway?”

Steve throws his hands up in frustration. Out of the corner of his eye, Bucky sees the other Commandos start to back out of the conversation, leaving Bucky and Steve to argue by their lonesome.

“It matters to me because I haven’t even gotten a _glimpse_ of my soulmate!” Steve’s breaths are labored, his chest rising and falling rapidly. Bucky would usually be afraid of the impending asthma attack, but they don’t have to worry about that now. “I spent my entire life wondering who she could be and being so excited to meet her and all I get is radio silence! Meanwhile, you’re out here without a care in the damn world, not giving a shit whether or not she’s actually trying to reach you. That’s bullshit, Barnes. She deserves better treatment than that.”

“You can’t force me to do something I don’t want, Steve!” Bucky retorts. “This is my business and my business only. I’m sorry if you don’t like it, but I don’t give a fuck what you think.”

“Fuck you, Barnes,” Steve growls. He pokes Bucky hard in the chest. “Somewhere out there, there’s someone who wants to love you unconditionally and you’re too much of a goddamn coward to actually let them.”

“Say that again.” Bucky takes a step closer, and they’re nearly chest-to-chest. Bucky doesn’t know if he wants to punch Steve or kiss him. “No, go on, Rogers. Tell me how you really feel.”

Steve’s eyes are so cold. “You heard me,” he says.

It’s deadly quiet for a moment, Bucky contemplating his next move. He pushes down the desire to fight, to bicker, to hurt, and steps back, but not before allowing a seething, “You’re a real piece of work, Rogers.”

As he retreats to his tent, Bucky hears Steve say, “Could say the same for you, Barnes.”

+++

It’s a few days later when Bucky finally gives up. Steve is nothing if not stubborn, and even though Bucky thinks that it’s none of Steve’s business anyhow, Bucky can’t help but understand where the guy is coming from.

He gains entrance to Steve’s tent, which is actually quite a bit larger than the other tents. He’s too busy looking around that he’s startled when someone clears their throat behind him.

He turns to see Steve standing there, looking terribly blank. Bucky can’t get a read on him, but he assumes that he’s still angry. He decides to skip the pleasantries and immediately just goes with, “I’m sorry.”

Steve quirks an eyebrow and says nothing. Bucky is uncomfortable. He rubs the back of his neck with his right hand, looking off to the side. “I’m sorry I said those things to you,” he clarifies. “I know that it’s hard for you, not knowing.”

Bucky finally meets Steve’s eye again, where his icy persona is visibly crumbling. Finally, Steve sighs and says, “No, don’t apologize. It’s not your fault and it’s not my business. Just because I feel one way doesn’t mean I get to tell you how to live your life. It’s your life.”

Bucky doesn’t believe that Steve is okay for a second. “Steve,” he says, because he knows Steve: it’s still bothering him.

Steve is quiet for a moment. “It’s fine,” he says. He runs his fingers over a map that sits on the table to his right. He won’t even look at Bucky.

“Steve…” He wants, then, more than anything, to tell Steve how he feels—how his soulmate doesn’t matter if it’s not Steve. But Bucky has already resigned himself to this fate. Steve is out of his reach, out of his touch. It doesn’t matter anymore; Steve will never be his, not when he is preoccupied with who is on the other side of the glass of his own mirror.

Steve is different from most people. He loves his soulmate, he loves them unconditionally and without fail. Even if they won’t look at him. His soulmate isn’t just an idea, another person who, theoretically, exists somewhere. Steve wants nothing more than to be with his soulmate, and he couldn’t, for the life of him, help but feel a little left behind.

The look on his face is enough to break Bucky’s heart. Half of him wishes he had his mirror with him, just for the sake of looking into it. But it’s not here. And even if it was, Bucky really is a coward. He keeps the mirror, but he’s too much of a coward to look into it. Steve was right.

“I’m sorry,” Bucky says. “I’m sorry she won’t look for you.”

Steve shakes his head angrily. “It’s not that. It’s just—” He cuts himself off before he continues, “I feel like—I feel like maybe she saw me. Maybe just once, before I could get a glimpse of her. She got her mirror before me, I know. I feel like she saw me once, and she saw how sick and small I was and decided she didn’t want me.”

Bucky is mortified. “Stevie, _no_. Of course not.”

“Can I blame her, though?” Steve says, and he’s finAlly looking at Bucky now, but he wishes he didn’t see the tears in Steve’s eyes, how red they are. “She thought—she thought she’d have to take care of me for the rest of my life, and there’s real slim pickins for the people who were actually okay with that.”

“Steve—” Bucky starts. If there would be any time to kiss him, he thinks, it would be now — now, to prove to him that he is lovable, loved, cherished. He can see himself reaching out and taking his face in his hands, holding him, comforting him, kissing the tears away from his cheeks.

He can see himself petting a hand through his hair, gripping it tight enough to pull his mouth to his.

But he doesn’t.

“So, yeah,” Steve interrupts. “It’s not my business. Excuse me.”

Steve turns and leaves his own tent, and Bucky is just standing there, wishing for the love of all things holy that Steve wasn’t hurting this much.

 

**FEBRUARY 24, 1944**

It’s so cold. Bucky doesn’t think he’s been warm since 1941, since before this whole shit-show started.

Bucky looks over the edge of the mountain, and he can’t help but feel like this is a bad idea. But he’s already told Steve how he feels about this, and there’s no going back now. They’ve been planning this for a while, now—months and months of planning, really.

 _Every variable has been accounted for,_ Steve had told him.

 _Bullshit_ , Bucky had said back. Right now, though, he keeps his mouth shut.

The others are listening to a radio a couple yards back, but Bucky is taking in the scenery; the high, sloping mountains, the unforgiving terrain. Despite how sharp and ragged it all looks, it’s also beautiful—the white snow, the crystalline rocks.

“Remember when I made you ride the Cyclone at Coney Island?” Bucky asks.

Steve raises an eyebrow and says, unimpressed, “Yeah, and I threw up?”

Bucky goes to the edge and looks out over the mountainside, his stomach swooping with nervousness and vertigo. There’s so much snow, and they’re so high in the air. “This isn’t payback, is it?” he asks, aiming for easy-going and missing by about a mile.

“Now, why would I do that?” Steve says, the little shit.

“We were right,” Gabe calls to them. Bucky and Steve turn around to face him. “Dr. Zola's on the train. Hydra dispatcher gave him permission to open up the throttle. Wherever he's going, they must need him bad.”

Monty huffs. “Let's get going,” he says in a clipped tone, “because they're moving like the devil.”

Steve seems to gather himself, gearing up for a fight. “We only got about a 10-second window,” he tells the team. “You miss that window, we're bugs on a windshield.”

“Mind the gap!” Monty reminds them, like an asshole. Of course they’re going to _mind the fucking gap._

Everyone starts grabbing their gear to make it over the zipline. Bucky pushes down the nervousness in his stomach, ready to shoot down into the abyss. He can hear the train rounding the corner.

“Better get moving, bugs!” Dum Dum says.

 

**1951**

The new arm is made of metal: heavy, unshakeable. He is always cold now.

 

**DECEMBER 21, 1991**

The Soldier knows that he is not as strong as this new team—he is not as powerful, and he’s not as efficient. Hydra has treated him like a test-run, like a design to be improved upon.

But he knows this will not last. Yes, he may not be as powerful, as efficient. But he is the one that they trust, he is tried and true. He will be the one triumphant — even as he wipes the blood from his mouth, the sweat from his forehead, he knows this.

They need him. He has won the fight for life this time.

 

**NOVEMBER 22, 2002**

The Soldier has read her file. She is turning 18 today.

Natalia is different from the rest of the other Widows. More dangerous, yes. More intelligent, yes. But more ruthless? Angrier? No, not at all. More sensitive to the emotions of others, more compassionate, even.

By order of the Red Room, she will not be getting a mirror today.

“No attachments,” Madame B tells him. “Nothing is more important than the mission.”

Something flickers at the back of the Soldier’s mind. He remembers a mirror, tucked up and locked away in a drawer. He wonders where it got to.

“Did you have a mirror?” she asks.

The Soldier looks away from where he’s unwrapping the cloth from his flesh hand. “I did,” he says shortly.

Natalia cocks her head. Her eyes are blank like that of someone who has been emptied out and drained of blood, of life, of memory. The Soldier recognizes it.

“You have a mirror?” she says, as if to clarify.

The Soldier looks over at her, where she is sitting in the middle of the floor. She had asked him to spar, and the Soldier had beaten her, with difficulty. Their fighting styles are different — he has brute strength, where she is slippery and silent as silk. When the Soldier can get a hold of her, he can beat her — but that is becoming more difficult, nowadays. She slips through his fingers like ribbons.

“Had,” he corrects her. “Not anymore.”

“Why not?”

“Soulmates are for people with souls.” He crumples up the gauze in his hand, pulls her to her feet. “Tend to your wounds,” he commands shortly.

 

**MAY 15, 2014**

When all is said and done, when the helicarriers are in the river and Steve is pulled safely to the shore, Bucky goes to a diner to get something to eat.

He hasn’t eaten a good meal since before the war — before then, he was stuck eating Spam and the other delicacies that his Army rations included. Disgusting, vile stuff, but miles better than the tasteless protein bars and IV drips that he got as the Winter Soldier.

There, he makes a plan. He wants to know who he is, who he was—he is decidedly not the Winter Soldier, and he’s not sure he is the same Bucky Barnes that he used to be. He has memories — vague, unfinished memories, that he wants to look up on.

But he has to see someone, first.

 

She is not easy to sneak up on — in fact, it is nearly impossible to do so. But the Soldier — Bucky — was her teacher. He taught her all her tricks, all her lessons.

He’s there when she comes home. When she comes in through the front door, it takes her a few seconds for her to realize that someone has broken in.

She clicks her tongue and whistles. “Liho,” she calls. Bucky hears something — a small bell. He presumes it’s the cat.

He hears her sigh, and Bucky smiles to himself. As if he would ever hurt the cat.

He’s not trying to hide. He’s sitting on the bed in her room, unarmed. Well — the gun in his waistband doesn’t count. Or the knife in his boot.

“James,” she says, when she comes into the bedroom.

“Natalia,” he greets.

She puts her gun down, visibly disarming, but still tense, on the defensive. “What are you doing here?”

He is getting better by the day, remembering more and more. He wants to remember himself, even if it’s difficult, even if it hurts. He needs to fess up for his crimes, he needs to be a human again. But first — “I need to find my mirror,” he says.

“Why?” she asks.

He licks his lip, drags his teeth along the bottom on, trying to find the easiest way to say it. “Soulmates are for people with souls,” he settles on.

She seems to visibly soften, as if she wasn’t expecting that answer. “I’ll see what I can do,” she says. She cocks her head to one side. “I’m assuming that I’m not allowed to tell Steve I’ve seen you.”

He sniffs, getting up from the bed. He is so much taller than her, it amuses him. “Nope,” he answers.

+++

It takes Natasha a fair while to get a hold of the mirror, the one that she’s sure is his.. Bucky had described it to her in the detail he remembers, and she fills in the blanks. She finds four potential matches, and then shows Bucky pictures of the candidates — and Bucky points it out immediately.

It’s in his possession a few days later, in a box, on the counter in his apartment when he arrives home with groceries. He didn’t even tell Natasha where he lived, and yet she made it inside.

He smiles to himself. “I taught you well,” he says to himself, setting the groceries down on the ground next to the counter while he goes and looks at the box.

He’s made a bet with himself. There’s a chance — a slim, slim chance — that his soulmate from his time is alive. If she is, Bucky will consider the idea that perhaps he is a person, a person who could perhaps earn forgiveness. If not — well. If not, there’s only one thing left to do.

 _Like pulling off a bandaid,_ he tells himself. In one swift movement, he lifts off the lid to the box.

The mirror looks a little different, but he can see that it was well-cared for. Natasha told him that it was in the possession of an art museum, showcasing it as a vintage soulmate mirror. It shines like it’s been polished, and while the mirror itself has a few black age spots, it looks great. Well, excluding the long, thin fracture across the mirror.

But it’s not dark. It’s not reflecting his face back at him. His soulmate — whoever it is — is _alive._

And—wait.

And no, it isn’t a trick of the light. Yes, it is fractured, but—there’s definitely someone there. A man. A _man_. God, and he looks just like—

“Steve?”

 

**MAY 18, 2014**

Bucky wishes it were so easy.

Half of him wanted to run again, to go into the night and never return. But when he watched Steve’s face change from confusion to shock and back again, finally settling on an emotion halfway between sadness and relief, he decided that he’d had enough — enough of himself, enough of his pitying, pathetic whining. Steve is out there, waiting for him; Steve finally has closure; Steve finally knows who his soulmate is. It’s his stupid, stubborn, asshole of a best friend.

The first thing he feels, besides relief, is a bone-crushing, all-consuming sense of shame. If he’d just looked into his mirror, just once, half a century ago, things would be so different now.

Steve deserves better, he knows. But he knows better than to make that decision for him — he did it for seventy years before. He won’t make that mistake again.

+++

Bucky shows up at Steve’s apartment in DC before Steve can start trying to find him again. Steve is out, Bucky isn’t sure what for, so he just lets himself in. The door is unlocked.

“Crazy bastard,” he mutters to himself.

 

He makes coffee for Steve and himself, using the fancy new coffee maker that Steve has. He isn’t familiar with it, but once he spends a little time with it, it’s fairly simple. It seems to only make one cup at a time, though.

He’s a little impatient, wondering where Steve has gone, and wanders around his apartment. It’s fairly clean, excepting the dishes in the sink, the clothes on the floor in Steve’s room. 

He wanders back into the kitchen and sits at the breakfast bar. In his boredom, he considers changing into Steve’s clothes — he’s a little dirty, but he’s not sure Steve’s clothes would fit him the same. He’s a lot thicker where Steve is lean, defined, wiry. He leaves it for now, not wanting to chance it, when the doorknob starts rattling.

Bucky perks up, looking to the door, nervousness tossing in his stomach. He sits a little straighter on the chair, sets the coffee cup down.

When the door swings open, Steve steps inside, dressed in athletic clothes. He’s a little sweaty, too, and Bucky assumes he’s gone for a run. He’s fumbling around for his keys, though, and doesn’t notice Bucky for several seconds.

When he does, though, he stops, stares for a long, long second, and lets the door swing shut.

When Steve doesn’t say anything, Bucky stands from his place at the breakfast bar and says, “Steve.”

“Bucky,” Steve says, breathless.

Taking a small step forward, Bucky says, tentative as ever, “ _Sweetheart_ ,” trying the word out on his tongue. He’s surprised to see that it _fits_ , that Steve is okay with it. More than okay — the guy practically melts, all six feet of him, and he rushes forward into Bucky’s arms, wrapping himself around him and enveloping him completely. It’s like being dunked into the sea — only that could rival how completely Steve engulfs him.

“Oh, Steve,” Bucky breathes, gripping the middle of his back with his metal hand. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay, Buck,” Steve mumbles into his shirt. By the wet sensation at his shoulder, Bucky suspects that he’s crying and doesn’t want anyone to see.  

“No,” Bucky insists, pulling back to get a proper look at him — and, yep, there are tears in Steve’s eyes, streaming silently down his face. “I hurt you. I’ve been hurting you for so long.”

“Bucky,” Steve says firmly, “it’s fine. Would you have rather been queer in the forties? When people would have lynched us for it?”

Bucky drops his head. “I don’t know. I don’t know. I just know that I was an asshole to you. And I’m sorry for that.”

Steve runs a hand through Bucky’s hair, gentle and sweet. “I guess you’ll just have to make it up to me,” Steve says, a wry grin turning up the corner of his mouth.

Heat shoots through Bucky’s body. It’s the first time he’s felt warm in nearly seventy years. “Oh, is that right?”

“Mm-hm,” Steve hums. The his smile drops, and he steps in just that much closer. “Kiss me,” he requests. “Please, Bucky.”

“Pal,” Bucky says, and he can feel Steve shiver when he moves his hand to cradle the back of Steve’s neck. “I thought you’d never ask.”

Bucky takes Steve’s face in his hands, brushing his thumbs over his cheekbones. When he kisses Steve, it’s soft and slow, gentle as ever. He’s so afraid of pushing too far, too fast. Steve has waiting for his soulmate for his entire life, and Bucky wants this to be perfect.

Steve follows Bucky’s lead, his grip gentling where he holds Bucky’s shirt, hands going slack. Closed-mouth, sweet, true — trying to tell Steve everything he ought to have told him more than half a century ago.

When they break apart, Bucky has tears in his eyes. He ducks his head, squeezes his eyes shut.

“I’m not doing so great,” he tells Steve thickly. “I have nightmares, flashbacks. I cry at the drop of a hat, now. And I’m not so nice to be around sometimes. I forget—”

“Bucky,” Steve interrupts. “You really think I’d turn you away? Now?”

And it’s everything he’s ever wanted, everything he didn’t know he needed, and not at all what he deserves. But Steve is reaching up, copying Bucky’s actions from earlier, and swiping a thumb under his cheekbone to help the tears dry.

“I love you, Steve,” Bucky says. “I always have.”

“I love you, too,” Steve says. He chuckles, smiles and says, “It’s always been you, Buck.”

And when Steve kisses him this time, it feels like making up for lost time. Bucky wraps his arms around Steve’s neck and lets himself drown in it.

* * *

For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face-to-face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

-CORINTHIANS 13:12


End file.
